Flixel Photos, a visual story telling startup has raised $2.2 million in seed round of funding led by Extreme Venture Partners along with Cranson Capital and angel investors in Australia and Canada. This funding announcement comes two years after the company’s revolved from a video-centric mobile social network to a tool set provider for photographers, videographers and brand marketers.

Founded in 2011 in Toronto, the startup Flixel provides a wide range of tools to photographers, videographers and marketers to create “Living Photos” or “Cinemagraphs” which is a still image with moving elements. The company’s technology enables users to create Cinemagraphs at ease on Mac, iPhone and iPad. It found real traction after a year of the relaunch of its mobile app when it released a desktop version for Mac.

Cinemagraph Pro for Mac took the number one spot in the Mac app store and won the company the 20114 Apple Design and Best of 2014 awards. It was reported sales of more than $250,000 in its first quarter after the switch. It aims to become the pioneer for discovering creating and sharing Cinemagraphs.

Flixel CEO and co-founder, Philippe LeBlanc said, ” “We had a thesis that said, ‘Instagram’s doing very well, there’s room for a social network for this new medium called cinemagraphs’. But what we saw from the consumer behaviour was that cinemagraphs is not something you will continuously do to document your life. What we saw was that artists were using it to create art, and for marketing purposes, there was an opportunity for brands to create high-engaging content,” in an interview.

Sunil Sharma, managing director of Extreme Venture Partners said, ” “Cinemagraphs have the potential to transform the creative and advertising world and we’ve been paying close attention to Flixel since they launched in 2011. The company has captured the imagination of creatives everywhere with their suite of cinemagraph creation apps which presents huge potential for success among photographers, videographers and digital marketers.”

The startup has recently teamed up with 67th Primetime Emmy Awards to produce a series of 13 living photos leading up to the event, which included cinemagraphs of this year’s host Andy Samberg and cinemagraphs from past events. It has an in-house production group called Flixel Studios that creates custom cinemagraph campaigns for partners like the Emmy Awards. The team was backstage at the Microsoft Theatre in Los Angeles with celebrity photographer Michael Grecco shooting real-time cinemagraphs at a Flixel Photobooth to capture live reactions of the winners and presenters.

LeBlanc also said, “Over the last two years we’ve evolved our vision for cinemagraphs from a simple mobile app to a full product suite of creative tools for professionals. It’s exciting to see the rapid adoption of Flixel among top brands and agencies and we’re confident that cinemagraphs will take their place alongside video and still photography as a premium advertising medium.”